Fitted carpet floor throughout the flat

[producer12999]

Hello, I've been looking for the perfect apartment with a large room for mixing (and producing) for a few days now. I clicked through hundreds of apartments and found out that rooms with more than 20 square metres are very rare here in Germany (and for the budget). And when there is one, it is completely asymmetrical with several doors leading to all kinds of rooms. (The toilet, the balcony, the kitchen or several windows then lead away from the large room, or the rooms have unsuitable dimensions)

I found an apartment with an extremely nice room of 22 square metres, but unfortunately the entire apartment has a carpeted floor. I haven't seen that before either. The apartment is generally very good looking. I know this will be a problem, what could I do to make my room not sound dead? What would you do in general? I don't want to plan my room acoustics on this carpet now (e.g. only hybrid absorbers with diffuser, I would have to compensate strongly) in case I move again sometime. Would you put foil over that carpet or something like that? The apartment has already been renovated...

Thank you very much!

 

[kemmler3D]

If you find that the carpet is causing unbalanced absorption that messes with your acoustics plan, you could use floor mat protectors to create hard surfaces again.

In other words, those plastic sheets that are used to protect carpets from office chairs: https://www.amazon.com/AM-America-Store-Chair-Carpet/dp/B0BPZWLN31

Not too expensive and a very normal sort of floor covering that should give you some high frequencies back if you need them.

It's actually a good idea to use them anyway, since landlords will sometimes charge you money if the carpet is damaged when you move out...

 

[kemmler3D]

Hard to say from the photo, looks like a very normal room to me... I think if you are willing to add a lot of treatments / diffusers / bass traps you should end up in a good place. Just make sure you start with good measurements and go from there.

 

[ozzy9832001]

Carpet looks super thin. I would be surprised if it absorbed anything under 6khz. I think even that is a stretch. The windows would probably be considered more problematic than the carpet.

 

[producer12999]

Carpet looks super thin. I would be surprised if it absorbed anything under 6khz. I think even that is a stretch. The windows would probably be considered more problematic than the carpet.

Sorry I deleted the photo so you can't find it in this forum via Google. I don't want anyone to know that production is going on inside.
The windows are not problematic, I put absorbers in front of them. In addition, the back wall is treated with thick panels. I sit in front of the windows.

And yes, that is exactly the problem. If there is no absorption below 6kHZ, a lot of treble is swallowed without bass being swallowed. That's the idea behind an unbalanced frequency response.

 

[AnalogSteph]

I wouldn't worry too much about it. Compared to the kind of treatment that you'll want to install, the carpet's effect should be quite insubstantial and easily compensated for in the iterative process of taking measurements and installing extra acoustic treatment.